Wiener Schnitzel!

Having stayed at the Wombat's Hostel in Munich, we were happy to find out that there was another in Vienna. We got into Vienna in the late afternoon and after settling in at the hostel we headed out in search of dinner. On the train over to Vienna, which went much more smoothly than our Munich to Prague journey, Oli made his craving for some Wiener Schnitzel and Apfel Strudel clear. So we went to one of Vienna's finest Schnitzel purveyors that night - see below picture.

                 It's true what they say: A picture speaks a thousand words.

After consuming that perfectly executed beast we went to check out some sights by night. The streets were quiet that night - being a Sunday. We found a night market and the smells that were emanating from all the food stands made us almost eat again. All types of Bratwurst and other sumptuous pork parts were being cooked up.
The Rathaus (which serves as the seat both of the mayor and city council of the city of Vienna) perfectly framed the night market and its Gothic style was our first view of the grandeur of the Austro-Hungarian empire. The ring (Ringstrasse), intricately manicured gardens and the Pestsäule were some of the sights from our first night. We headed back to the hostel.
We found ourselves playing cards at the hostel bar and playing the "Identify the song" game that the bar had organized. The prize was a shot of the Austrian version of Jägermeister. Yours truly kept guessing the songs, but given my repulsion to liquorice or anything tasting like liquorice I was handing these off to Oli - which provided some great entertainment later. :)
The bar started off sleepy, with only a handful of others. However, the infamous Contiki tour bus had just pulled in with everyone's favorite travelers - Aussies! The bar was absolutely hoppin' after this! Oli and I put the cards away and we were chatting with several of them. There were also a group of younger Germans who were there as well. One member of this group had a insane resemblance to McLovin and we definitely shared a good laugh over that.
Everyone was having a great time and this same group of Germans approach us a little while later, one of the guys asks me, " Hey do you have any weed?" Before I could even respond Oli interjects with, "Wait, why did you ask him!?" Without missing a beat he responds, "Well he's black isn't he?" Oli was more appalled than I was at this point. This did shed some light into the random girl in Munich who came up to me and askd for cocaine. This was definitely a night to remember - I still retell this story on occasion.


The next day we headed out to the legendary Schönbrunn Palace, situated in the West of the city.. I would say it is only second to Versailles in terms of size and opulence. It is impeccably kept, the gardens are are so well maintained I didn't even see a rock out of place.

                               A courtyard of one of the 'smaller' buildings


Surprisingly Vienna turned out to be more diverse than I had expected, and it reflected on its cuisine too.
For lunch, we decided to have some Moroccan food.

Unfortunatley, being a Monday most of the museums were closed. We missed going to the Albertina and The Belvedere Palace. However, we did check out Hundertwasser Haus. Built by the Architect of the same name it is an apartment building that has now become an expressionist landmark.

                                                       Hundertwasser Haus

We grabbed some dinner then headed back to the hostel. Oli had a phone interview scheduled for that night. Our mate Dan, who we met in Prague also had arrived and was staying at the same hostel, we grabbed a quick drink with him. I called it an early night as we had a long day of travel scheduled; back to Munich then flight out to Dubrovnik.

Vienna: Prim and proper dashed with some old-world charm.
See you in Croatia.

On the banks of the Vltava river....a failed hair cut!!

We arrived in Prague later than anticipated, due to the added journey time. It was cooler (but still pleasant) than it had been in Oktoberfest - or maybe all those steins had managed to shield us from the brisk weather.

In reading our guides I was surprised at the sights that Prague had. None of them as famous as the other landmarks in Europe, but definitely able to hold their own. Prague castle, The Astronomical Clock, St Vitus Cathedral and Charles Bridge to name a few.

Before we get to the sights, we had to navigate our way to the hostel which was a short tram ride away from the hustle and bustle of the city center. First impression of the people of Prague was positive - a businessman seeing that we were confused as to which tram to take to our hostel - kindly assisted us, in English to beat!

We get to our hostel and both Oli and I are stunned. Absolutely stuuuuuned! Probably one of the best hostels I had been in. It could rank amongst a 3.5 star hotel! The name, admittedly was a bit cheesy : Czech Inn - should've taken some pics.

For dinner that night - we went to a Thai place! Yeah, in the middle of Eastern Europe and we wind up going to a Thai place. Go figure! But, it was pretty good, and we were loving the non-euro prices in Prague. This meal (with a bottle of wine) would've been easily 80euros, I think we paid something like 30euros equivalent. Koruna is the currency of The Czech republic; US$1 = ~17 Koruna.

The fabled Pilsner beer, has it's roots in the Czech republic - in fact we passed through Plzeň on our journey to Prague. That being said, beer is cheaper than bottled water in Prague ( and I'm guessing in the rest of country, too). In fact, when we were there I think beer was half the price of bottled water. 'Prague', does that translate to beer heaven..?? No complaints from the both us!

We headed back to the hostel after dinner and called it an early night - still reeling from our added journey time and the after effects of Oktoberfest.

In the morning we had a packed schedule for the day of sight-seeing, among them:
Prague castle, The Astronomical Clock, St Vitus Cathedral and Charles Bridge

                               View from Prague castle, Charles bridge on the bottom right.

                                          Charles bridge and Prague Castle.

I was really impressed with everything, the cleanliness was surprising. However, we did have an unpleasant experience at the Prague castle, where we encountered some rude service.

Also, travelers of colour -beware to be stared at - a lot! Everytime I got onto the tram, I just felt the gaze of the entire carriage.

The following day we went on a guided walking tour of Prague, which was great. The guide really knew his stuff. We got to learn some history about the Velvet Revolution and walked through Kafka's neighbourhood. Highly recommend! We also learned of a Pub Crawl that was to happen later that night. After having a couple days to recover from the epicness of Oktoberfest we decided to check it out. We were to meet in front of the Astronomical clock.

                                         Astronomical Clock in the Old Town Square

Before it was time for the pub crawl I decided my head was in need of a fresh shaving. I had taken my clippers with me on the trip and conveniently the hostel bathroom had a power outlet I could use. I had finished half of my head when the clippers decided to give-out. So there I am.....with half a head shaved and half...well...not so much. Fortunately I had brought along a hat, and I met Oli down at the lobby and show him the new hairstyle I would be rockin' that night (hidden by the hat). EPIC FAIL!!! The clippers, although had what looked like the adapter was not compatible with the different voltage in Europe. Mark that under the should've-known-better column.

The crawl attracted a huge crowd and we ended up going to 5 or 6 pubs/clubs. We started the night of with some Absinthe shots and made friends with a Sydneysider, Dan.

At the pen-ultimate club, Daniel (who is of Malaysian descent) was coaxed into chatting up some Asian girls. After a few minutes he returns with a look of defeat. The story goes, that upon finding out the girls were from Kazakhstan, Dan couldn't help asking, "Oh do you guys like Borat?!" some-what enthusiastically. This question was met by stone-cold stares by the group of girls and an eventual walk of shame for Dan.

Prague, you were great (minus the awkward stares!) :)

Prost!!

Munich during Oktoberfest is a zoo! Albeit, in a good way in my opinion. Two weeks in late September and early October where many beer lovers gather in what many of them consider their mecca.

I met up with a mate of mine, Oli, at the Munich airport. He was arriving from London, as he had just finished his Master's only a few weeks before. We had landed in the morning, and had the rest of the day to explore. That day we decided not to head to the Theresienwiese ('Wiesen'), the large grounds where Oktoberfest is held. Instead we went to the hallowed Augustiner Bräu restaurant (the oldest independently owned brewery in Munich). There, we had the still in-season Augustiner WeissBier - one sip of that golden nectar cured any sign of jet-lag I may have been suffering (or so I'd like to believe). Along with our beer we indulged in some Pork knuckle. Ah the Pork-knuckle..... I think I may have eaten Pork knuckle 3 times during our 3 day stay! It's roasted until golden and crispy and braised in beer! What's not to love!?!?

                                          One of many Pork knuckle dinners


The following day we headed early to the Wiesen. We got there around 10:30, still trying to recover from the previous night at the hostel where we had a few more litres of beer than we had planned. We moseyed over to the HofBräuhaus 'tent' eager to get ourselves a spot at the infamous HofBräuhaus and try a HofBräu Oktoberfest beer. Oli was struggling and needed a gigantic pretzel to kick the effects of the previous night. The crowd started to get boisterous towards 2pm. By this time the band was in full swing, regularly blasting:
"Ein Prosicht", "Alice", "Seven Nation Army" by White Stripes and our favorite - Fliegerlied (So ein schöner tag). Before long, the alcohol had reduced inhibitions and people were making friends all around us. 

                                          HofBräu Festzelt

                                          Inside look


Out of the blue a girl approached myself and Oli, she started to talk to me with the usual banter, in hindsight I realized her speech was a bit slurred. I didn't think too much of it at the time, after all this was the largest drinking festival in the world!!! When I found out that she was from London, I was like "Oh my friend (pointing to Oli) is from London. She didn't even bother to look toward him. Within a matter of seconds after she asks, "Can I ask you an inappropriate question?". Hesitantly, " Ummm... sure. What's up?". "Do you have any cocaine?". To which, I was dumbfounded, I recall saying something to the affect "I'm sorry, but you're barking up the wrong tree". Before I knew it she had left as soon as she had come over. I was gobsmacked, and all Oli and I could do was laugh and have another litre of HofBräuhaus' finest. We ended up finishing 6 Stein's (litres) that night and were able to amble our way back to the hostel without too much incident.

The following day we ended up spending the most time at the HofBräuhaus tent again. Mostly because it was the biggest and it had an international feel to it. We did go by the Späten tent and the Hippodrome, which were both good too. We were able to meet up with some of Oli's friends from grad school, and some of my friends from California, who unplanned, had turned up at Munich. Thank god for Oli, if it wasn't for him I probably wouldn't have made it back to the hostel that second night! Yeah, it was that epic!! 7 Steins is not a joke people!!!

We woke up the next morning feeling the worst we had felt throughout the past 3 days. We were on our way to Prague. Having booked a direct train we were looking forward to catching up on sleep/beating our hangovers!

I was in and out of sleep, Oli was reading a book - all of a sudden during a stop near the border I realized that everyone in our carriage had got off. I thought this was rather peculiar and even said so to Oli. Neither of us took it too seriously as we thought this may be a popular stop. The train started to move, yet, I was still unsettled. Moments pass by, and I see an Engineer (he had an orange vest on) come through to our carriage. I think we looked at each other and simultaneously uttered some cuss words, his were in German. Suffice to say we were no longer on our way to Prague, rather the depot at that station. The train had split up and we were lucky enough to be in the two carriages that were being sent to the depot. In the end, what was a direct train turned out to be a 5 connection passage to Prague - in some cases we only had 2 minutes between trains! In the end this added a good 3 hours to our journey time as well. Hangover gone!

No sleep, but definitely a good story.

Munich is probably one of my favorite cities in Europe - in spite of getting asked for cocaine at the Wiesen. Definitely plan on going back! Pork knuckle and Weissbier; until we meet again!

More to come hope you guys enjoyed the first installment. Bear with me as I perfect this Blogging thing.
Also keep in mind this blog will skip around my travels as I have stories from years ago that will be shared at random times.

Cheers or Prost, until my next post!